New International, April 1948

M. Young

Books in Review

Fighting Filipinos

The Philippine Story
by David BernsteinFarrar, Straus & Co., New York 1947, 276 pp.

As a historical survey of the Philippines, through the years of
Spanish, American, and Japanese imperialist domination, David
Bernstein’s story is valuable for its wealth of encyclopedic fact
on the development of this sprawling archipelago, in spite of the
fact that the author – an ex-newspaperman and liberal advisor to
the Philippine government during the war – has no insight into the
politics of imperialism and even shows traces of the White Man’s
Burden philosophy.

The first portion of the book deals with the Filipino struggle
against Spanish misrule and corrupt exploitation under soldiers of
fortune and the clergy. The story is given of the first national hero
of the Philippines, Jose Rizal – well-born, conservative
intellectual who rejected revolutionary methods of struggle against
the overlords – whose execution by the Spanish was the spark that
set off the national revolt in earnest toward end of the nineteenth
century. The principal leaders of this new movement were Bonifacio
and Aguinaldo, who organized a central revolutionary committee for
raising an army of 30,000 men. Despite a temporary deal between
Aguinaldo and the Spaniards, this rebellion was still raging when
America declared war on Spain in 1898.

When, at the conclusion of that war, a U.S. military governor was
proclaimed supreme ruler of the islands, the insurrectos
decided that it mattered little to them whether their oppressors
spoke Spanish or English; the revolt continued, this time against the
Americans. They were brutally crushed by 85,000 troops. Thus began
the “American experiment in benevolent assimilation,” as
President McKinley sanctimoniously put it. The major portion of the
book deals with this “experiment.”

Bernstein plumps heavily for the fiction of “liberal
imperialism” and, of course, he has accomplishments to point to:
the use of Filipinos in administrative posts in the government, mass
education, etc. But back in 1898 a franker statement of U.S. aims in
the islands was made before Congress by Senator Lodge:

“We make no hypocritical pretense of being interested
in the Philippines solely on account of others. While we regard the
welfare of these people as a sacred trust, we regard the welfare of
the American people first. We believe in trade expansion.”

The war years are dealt with rather cursorily, but the
capitulatory role of the Filipino bourgeoisie is duly noted. A
serious shortcoming of the book, however, is the author’s failure
to deal with the peasant and labor movements more than in passing.
The Hukbalahap, embracing tens of thousands of peasants, and the
growing Congress of Labor Organization certainly deserve at least
equal space with the intra-cabinet gossip that is given in such
detail. The Huks, the militant peasant army that threw as much fear
into the hearts of the Filipino bourgeoisie as it did into the hearts
of the Japanese invaders, certainly deserve more than the meager
paragraphs donated to them. This is merely a further indication of
the author’s reliance for progress from “above.”

A revealing section of the book consists of an analysis of the
economics of liberation, and if there remains anyone who still doubts
the deceptive and spurious nature of the recently granted
independence, let him pore over Mr. Bernstein’s notes on the Trade
Bill of 1946. He will be forced to conclude with the author that here
again the United States is indulging in “nothing more than a
streamlined and unsubtle demonstration of economic imperialism.”
And once more is established the irrefutable evidence that President
Manuel Roxas, former collaborator with the Japanese, and elected
president with the aid of General MacArthur, acts as a mere tool of
American imperialist interests in the Philippines.

Twice in their history the hopes of the people of the Philippines
of achieving genuine independence were shattered against the rocks of
American imperialism-the first time in 1896 when American military
rule replaced Spanish oppression; the second time in 1945 when
Japanese imperialist rule was replaced by the American variety. This
historical duplication is serving as the basis for educating vast
numbers of Filipinos in the basic facts of imperialist politics: that
of they are to write a happy ending to The Philippine Story,
they must rely only upon themselves to do it.